DisplaySearch: OEMs outsourced 23% of LCD TVs in Q3'07

DisplaySearch's recent Q3 study, "LCD TV Value Chain Report," found that as the LCD TV market continues to expand, many LCD TV OEMs are increasing their outsourcing share for certain regions and products.

According to the market researcher, 23 per cent of the 2.01 crore LCD TV units shipped in the third quarter of 2007 were manufactured by subcontractors including TPV, Jabil, AmTRAN, Quanta, Proview, Vestel and Wistron. The report also found that many LCD TV manufacturers outsourced 100 per cent of their LCD TV set manufacturing, including Grundig, HP, Polaroid, Vizio, ViewSonic and Westinghouse.

The study also ranked the top subcontractors for LCD TVs and their biggest customers. TPV led the TV set subcontract manufacturing market with a 19.9 per cent share in Q3, followed by Proview, Jabil and AmTRAN. The primary customer for TPV is Philips, which outsourced more than 60 per cent of its LCD TVs in Q3, while the key customer for AmTRAN is Vizio. The primary customer of Proview is Polaroid, and the main customer of Jabil is Philips.

In addition, the report showed that 2.37 crore LCD TV modules were shipped from TFT LCD makers, while LCD TV manufacturers shipped 2.01 crore units. These variances were mainly due to supply chain, assembly lead time, buffer stocks and channel inventory, said DisplaySearch.

The top seven LCD TV module suppliers for Q3 ranked by DisplaySearch are AUO, LPL, CMO, Samsung, Sharp, CPT and IPS-Alpha. Top customers include some of the big gun LCD TV makers such as Hitachi, LGE, Panasonic, Philips, Samsung, Sharp, Sony, and Toshiba. Each of the top five suppliers looked to their top five customers for at least 50 per cent of their volume, with the exception of CMO, according to DisplaySearch.

The study also reports that more than 20 lakh LCD monitor panels shipped were used for LCD TVs in Q3, up significantly from 900,000 in Q2. Sizes included 15-, 17-, 19-, 20- and 22inch. LCD TVs under 26 inches will increasingly use LCD monitor panels, especially for wide products such as 19-, 20- and 22inch, according to the study.

What is LCD? What is an LCD TV?
A display technology that uses rod-shaped molecules (that flow like liquid and bend light. Unenergized, the crystals direct light through two polarizing filters, showing a natural background color. When energized, the crystals redirect the light to be absorbed in one of the polarizers, causing the dark appearance of crossed polarizers to show. The contrast and viewing angle improve as the molecules are twisted further. LCD TV
Liquid-colour display television (LCD TV) sets use LCD technology to display images. LCD TVs are lighter than CRT TV sets and consume less power.